Father sent to prison, relatives to jail, following infant's death

Updated 9:26 pm, Friday, December 14, 2012

An ex-con who killed his infant son was ordered Friday to serve 30 years in prison, and four more family members were sent to jail for a subsequent courtroom outburst that included knocking over a TV camera.

Craig Andre Sorrell, 31, and his attorney had asked for a 10-year sentence for the reckless injury to a child charge, insisting the severe brain injuries 2-month-old Deandre Sorrell incurred in January 2011 were the result of an accidental tumble.

But the defendant had reached a plea agreement in October in which prosecutors agreed to ask for a sentence of between five and 30 years in prison, and state District Judge Maria Teresa Herr decided the higher end was more appropriate.

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“He claims it was an accident, but the injuries were not consistent with what he said happened,” prosecutor Catherine Hayes said, describing the head trauma as “catastrophic.”

The judge ordered deputies to take Sorrell's wife, two brothers and a sister-in-law into custody after their reaction to the sentence included shouting profanities and overturning the Fox 29 news camera, which had initially been brought into the courtroom to record an unrelated hearing.

Each family member was charged with hindering a court proceeding by disorderly conduct, a Class A misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail.

Deandre Sorrell survived for 15 months after the injuries, but his quality of life was greatly diminished, his grandmother told court authorities. He was legally blind and had seizures, respiratory problems and a feeding tube, she said. The baby's April 2012 autopsy listed complications from the earlier blunt force trauma as his cause of death.

Craig Sorrell initially told officers the infant fell off a bed and onto a carpeted floor while he was trying to change a diaper. Through tears, he later admitted to police that he “jerked” a blanket out from underneath the baby, which caused her to hit her head on a wrought-iron coffee table and then a hardwood floor.

Sorrell acknowledged he acted recklessly that day but never expected the child to get hurt, defense attorney Bo Wood said.

Although Sorrell had spent the first six years of his adulthood in prison for robbery, he later spent almost as many years after that working at Cracker Barrel as he turned his life around, Wood said.

“He went eight years without even a ticket,” Wood said. “He seemed like a pretty solid citizen.”